For a time, he was posted at St. Peter Catholic Church in Reserve, which dates back to 1864. In Slidell, he served at St. Luke the Evangelist, a modern, suburban parish with a church built in the 1980s.

About four years ago, he was named the founding pastor of Most Holy Trinity, a new parish carved out of the sprawling Mandeville-Covington corridor. Since that time, he has been celebrating Mass in a pet shop.

It's a converted pet shop, actually -- the old Mr. Fish, on the busy U.S. 190 service road. Repeated, concerted efforts to find a permanent home for Bourg's congregation in the unincorporated area north of Mandeville have been unsuccessful.

No one knows that better than Archbishop Gregory Aymond.

Finding a new home for Most Holy Trinity Catholic Church is a priority for the archdiocese, one of several north shore-specific issues being addressed by the new archbishop.

"That has been a very difficult challenge," Aymond acknowledged in a recent interview. "I know it's been frustrating for Father Bourg, frustrating for his parishioners, and also for me over the last year, and I'm only in it for a year. We really want to bring it to a conclusion."

Aymond is no stranger to St. Tammany Parish.

"As a native New Orleanian, I've always looked with great delight on the north shore," he said. "I was a student at St. Joseph Seminary College (near Covington) for four years. As rector of the seminary and auxiliary bishop I was always back and forth on the north shore and making retreats at the abbey."

"So I've always looked with great favor on the north shore, and always been aware that it really does have a very different culture, a very different feel to it."

After nine years in Texas, Aymond returned to the region last year to take charge of an archdiocese that was still struggling to regain its footing after an array of Hurricane Katrina-related difficulties. The specific needs of the church on the north shore might not have registered as his most pressing priority, but they did get his attention.
Now the archdiocese is moving to address the particular challenges facing church parishes on the north side of Lake Pontchartrain.

Aymond announced earlier this month that the archdiocese is planning to establish a stand-alone satellite office in St. Tammany Parish, signaling a new commitment to the burgeoning Catholic population there.

Suburban St. Tammany has 91,382 Catholics in 15 church parishes; another 18,172 Catholics live just to the north in rural Washington Parish. They account for more than 23 percent of the estimated 471,700 Catholics in the Archdiocese of New Orleans.

The archbishop already has met twice with a group of St. Tammany priests to address how the church is keeping up with the area's growth and what needs to be done to better meet the needs of north shore Catholics. They will be meeting for a third time this month to continue that study.

And that's not all.

Archdiocesan administrators also are exploring options for dealing with the population boom at Mandeville's Our Lady of the Lake, one of the largest church parishes in the entire archdiocese. The church's pastor has released to his parishioners and the public a sketch of a proposed new church that should be large enough to relieve the overcrowding that has beset the Old Mandeville parish for years.

The archdiocese has started a feasibility study to determine what the church parish can afford to build, in light of its expansion needs. However, the pastor's plans for a massive Gothic structure have met with neighborhood opposition.

"I've heard that and I've gotten letters to that effect," Aymond said. "As one might imagine, I've gotten many letters about these things. We're still a ways off. Obviously, that question has to be part of the conversation.

"For the church, we always want to do what's right, what's for the good of the parish and the good of the people. Sometimes we do have to make decisions that don't please people but our desire is not to make decisions that displease people."

As Aymond makes his way across the metro area, old acquaintances and those meeting him for the first time are still letting him know how much it means to them to have a home-grown archbishop who understands the character of the area's people and its distinctive communities.

"For me, it's a humble privilege to be back in the Archdiocese of New Orleans," he said. "People often ask are you glad to be here. I say very honestly I'm glad to be home, and there's no place like home."

Later this week, Aymond will mark the first anniversary of his installation as archbishop. His plans for the day are modest, he said: "I'll say Mass quietly and thank God for my blessings."

Ron Thibodeaux is the St. Tammany bureau chief. He can be reached at rthibodeaux@timespicayune.com or 985.898.4834.